If you are a frequent reader of Miscelana you know that there is a passion for historical series, where I discuss and highlight real facts portrayed in period series. (If it is not yet, the warning is). With this, I again praised another great performance of Ludvigne Sagnier in another performance of a woman of importance in history, in the case of American independence, and was not so known to the general public: French composer Anne Louise Brillon de Jouy.

After shining in a great season of the Serpent Queen series, Lupin as well as in Napoleon, Ludvigne is the romantic interest of Benjamin Franklin in the Apple Plus series, Franklin, and has stolen the scene.

Franklin is a vehicle for actor Michael Douglas, who lives the title character, and is an adaptation of the Pulitzer-winning novel, A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France and the Birth of America, written by Stacy Schiff. In just eight episodes, the series chronicles the mission of inventor Benjamin Franklin on a trip of an extremely important trip to France, where he planned and conspired to promote a Franconian alliance and overcome the War of American Independence. In the search for supporters, he met Anne Louise de Brillon, and soon a connection was born between them.

About the true Madame de Brillon de Jouy

In direct contrast to the living and decided Diane Poitiers, from The Serpent Queen, in Franklyn Ludivine, brings sadness and palpable frustrations for sweet Anne Louise, who was born 280 years in 1744, in Paris, being married at 15 Years with Jacy Jouy Jacques, 22 years older than her.

Submissive and well-educated like all the women of her time, she kept in her home the atmosphere she met as a child, with music, painting, and literature performing fundamental roles in the Brillons’ Home.

Mother of two girls, as the series shows, Anne Louise lived in Passy and had a conflicting relationship with her husband who was a womanizer and openly humiliated her with her lovers. Having to live with this relationship caused an increasingly deep depression in the composer, who found in the passion for music something to help deal with her unhappiness.

Every Wednesday and Saturday, Anne Louise received guests at her home and circled artists, including foreign musicians who performed with her. Gradually the Soirées gained fame and prestige, and she became famous as a music and songwriter. Being a woman, her work was not touched publicly or published, but several composers devoted her sonatas, including Johann Schobert, Luigi Boccherini, Charles Burney, Ernst Eichner, and Henri-Joseph Rigel.

As we saw in Franklin, many of his music was instrumental, and many were composed to play and sing with their daughters. Of the almost 90 compositions of his credit, the writings stand out for piano, where it is possible to identify it as a virtuoso and with innovations that were only seen years later with pianists like Czerny and Liszt.

Anne Louise’s name was obviously better-known thanks to her friendship with Benjamin Franklin, whom she met in 1777 as ambassador to the American colonies. He was a neighbor of Brillon, and the immediate charm was mutual.

The two came to meet daily to explore music, drink tea, and play chess. Their proximity, which lasted their lives from there, was so significant that she composed a sonata to celebrate an American victory in her struggle for independence.

Friendship with Franklin

Benjamin Franklin was 38 years older than Anne Louise and was already known as a scientist, inventor, and diplomat, and the Apple TV Plus series focuses precisely on the least explored side of his biography, which is his (crucial) involvement in American politics, showing the difficulties of finding allies, betrayal and criticism in France.

His connection with women, according to his biographers, helped him to circulate more easily by the French court, and Franklin also used his reputation and popularity to obtain public support while ensuring the secret help of the French government. However, they often considered these relationships somewhat amoral and scandalous, as if he had kind of lost the focus of his mission. As the former president later described, “The purest and most useful friend a man could acquire was a Frenchwoman of a certain age who had no projects in her person. They are so ready for their service and, by their knowledge of the world, know how to serve wisely, ”he said.

Benjamin Franklin’s main friend was clearly Anne-Louise Brillon from Jouy. During the four years in Paris, he attended her house almost every Wednesday and Saturdays, where

Go with her and her husband, as well as her daughters. In letters exchanged between them, the fact that there was flirting between them and even intense, when Franklin tried to make the relationship more than a friendship, admitting that “coveting his neighbor’s wife” and suggesting that “the most way Effective to get rid of a certain temptation ”is“ satisfying it ”. Anne Louise skilledly dodged, for as biographers report, she had her father figure and claimed that “women and men could not deal with temptation in the same way.”

Still, the gossip rolled loose in Paris, so much so that Anne Louise writes to him that “certain criticisms had been uttered by people who meet in society about the kind of familiarity that reigns among us,” but even “at peace” with His conscience, “is not sufficient: one must submit to what is called ownership (the word varies every century in all lands!). Although I can’t sit on the knee so often, it certainly won’t be because I love you less; Our hearts will be no less pure anymore, but we will have closed the mouths of evil speakers, and this is no little, even for a wise, ”he explained.

Franklin will show that Anne Louise has helped the American disturb British ambassador Lord Stormon from defeating the independence movement preventing the help of the French government to the rebels. It was she who called “her kind father” with the most influential people in society, with teas, lunches, and exhibitions, occasions that allowed Franklin to promote the cause of Americans.

In France, revolutionaries threatened the life of Anne Louise

After France formally recognized the United States as a nation, the friendship and influence of Anne Louise with Franklin continued to prestige her, with the songwriter interceding with her requests and her in different aspects, from favors to common friends or being an intermediary of any question.

While supporting the end of the monarchy in America was of interest to Anne Louise, when the regime ended in France she went through bad times, like many noble and rich French. The French Revolution ended the Brillon’s receptions, and needed to survive, rescue their furniture, support their family, and deal with turbulence after losing several of her grandchildren, Anne Louise lived very difficult days. She divided her time between Paris and her brother-in-law’s Château in Villalers, Normandy, keeping the music with a special place in her life to the end.

It was in Villars that she passed away 200 years ago in 1824 with an incredible trajectory in world history. Anne was 80 years old. She lived 34 more years than Benjamin Franklin, who returned to the United States and died in 1790 at her home in Philadelphia, a pleuritic attack at age 84. Giving relevance to his friendship with Anne Louise is undoubtedly a beautiful tribute to one of his main supporters and one of Franklin‘s highlights

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